Saban has been to Alabama's Pro Day before as a coach in the NFL

Alabama coach Nick Saban (left) watches Pro Day workouts next to the Kansas City Chiefs' Gary Gibbs. (The Birmingham News / Bernard Troncale)TUSCALOOSA - Alabama coach Nick Saban made a host appearance an hour or so into the three-hour Pro Day today in the Crimson Tide's Hank Crisp Indoor Facility. He mingled with representatives of NFL teams who gathered to evaluate his pro prospects and then spoke for a few minutes with the news media.

The event brought back memories to the coach who served two years as an NFL head coach with the Miami Dolphins before he came to Alabama and several years as an assistant coach with the Houston Oilers and Cleveland Browns.

He recalled coming to Alabama when he was the Browns' defensive coordinator. He reminisced about the fact that he and Herman Edwards, most recently the Kansas City Chiefs' head coach, were called upon to throw passes to defensive backs at various Pro Days.

"I came to a couple in this building," Saban said today. "When Antonio Langham and that group were seniors, George Teague and all that, I was in this building doing what these guys are doing. In fact, it brings back memories every year when I come here. The turf's better now than it was then."

Saban was asked if pro people evaluate talent uniformly.

"I think everybody sort of has a criteria for what they're looking for, probably for all players at all positions," he said. "Some people who play a Cover 2 might want one kind of corner, people that play man-to-man might want another type of corner. Same thing at just about every position. Most of the teams have pretty defined criteria of what they're looking for and the kind of players they want in each category, whether it's first receiver, second receiver, punt returner or whatever it is."

So is a 40-yard dash really that important?

"I still think in the NFL, they're still a little caught up in measurables," Saban said. "They have a history of what people have run at that particular position and been successful, what size they've been, what they vertical jump, what they run the short shuttle in, and that's meaningful to some people.

"You have two sort of types: people that are production oriented and people that are measurable oriented. The production oriented people are going to take what a guy does as a football player and put more value in it. Some people that are into measurables are going to take all those things and think that that's going to make a guy a good football player because he can do those things. I think it's probably a combination of both. It's probably the best way you want to be."

Saban was asked about Kareem Jackson, who is skipping his senior season against his head coach's advice. Saban wanted Jackson to come back because he was not rated a first-round draft choice by an advisory board, but the player's stock has risen since he impressed NFL people with his speed a little more than a week ago at the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis.

"If there was a question about him as a player, it was probably, 'What's his flat speed?'" Saban said. "When he ran a good time, that probably made the decision he made a good decision. Now if he hadn't run a good time, it might've made it a bad one. There's always a little bit of risk.

"We still want guys to stay in school if they've not first-round draft picks, and we encourage them to go out for the draft if they are first-round draft picks. I still think that's a good rule of thumb, because graduating from school has a tremendous amount of value as well. We're always going to continue to promote that in our program."